


Cold Comfort

by sourassin (scherryzade)



Series: Dwarrowdams [8]
Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, Everybody Lives, F/M, Female Dori, Female Nori (Tolkien), M/M, Not Canon Compliant, Poorly Resolved Sexual Tension, Snippet, Unrequited Love, Unresolved Romantic Tension, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-29
Updated: 2018-12-29
Packaged: 2019-09-30 04:17:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,603
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17216819
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scherryzade/pseuds/sourassin
Summary: Thorin survived the battle, barely, and now Dwalin sits vigil at his bedside, careless of his own health. Nori goes to distract him, but can’t bring herself to goad him as she did on the quest...





	Cold Comfort

**Author's Note:**

> Another snippet from my Sisters Ri AU. Little underdeveloped - I just really had to post something before the end of the year.

Nori has always thought that if ever this - flirtation, tension, whatever it is - between her and Dwalin was to come to a head, then it would be because she’d pushed too hard. That she’d found the spot to prod that made Dwalin snap instead of just growl and glare.

She’s always thought she’d corner him one day, and tease and goad, and for once he wouldn’t turn tail, grumbling, but push back, corner _her_ , press her back against the stone and - well, if she’s thought about it a little too much, who can blame her?

It doesn’t happen like that.

Balin knocks on the door of the chambers she and her sisters have settled in, and Dori bustles to let him in and get him seated. He looks tired, weary in more than body. Nori isn’t surprised - they all are.

"I’ll put the kettle on," Dori says brightly.

"I don’t want to impose," says Balin.

‘Not at all! A cup of tea is no imposition," says Dori. "The kettle’s already filled." She makes shooing motions at Nori behind Balin’s back.

Nori rolls her eyes at her sister, but says, "Right, I’m off. ‘Ave to see a dwarf about a - rockface."

"Actually, it’s you I’ve come to see," says Balin.

"Well!" says Dori, and spins to fuss with the kettle, shoulders tightening.

"What for?" asks Nori, settling back in her seat.

"I have a favour to ask. My brother-" Balin sighs. "He sits vigil at Thorin’s side, and will not be moved from his post. He has not slept in a bed these two weeks, and I can do nothing to persuade him that it does neither he nor Thorin any good to wear himself out in this way. I know you have a knack for distracting him-"

"Ha! A nice way to put it," mutters Dori.

"-and I know it is presumptuous to ask this, but - will you go to him? Take his mind off all this-"

"Now wait just a second," snaps Dori, spinning to face them once more. "What the deuce are you suggesting she-"

"It’s alright," says Nori. "I don’t mind."

"I don’t suppose you do," says Dori. "Never mind this supposed to be a fresh start for us-"

"There’s hardly enough dwarrow here to start a rumour, even if they cared to. I don’t mind - really, Dori, it’ll be fine."

Dori huffs and puffs, but bites her tongue.

"I’ll try," Nori tells Balin. "Can’t guarantee anything. He likely won’t look twice at me."

"I’m very grateful to you, Mistress Nori-"

Nori snorts. "Aye, well." She stands, and Balin mirrors her, just as Dori brings the teapot to the table. "Oh, sit, sit. Drink yer tea. I’ll likely be back in five minutes, missing a limb."

The healing rooms are as far from the treasury as they can be while still remaining beneath several metres of health-giving rock. Nori finds them stifling.

Thorin has a room to himself - the lads, recovered enough to be restless, have been moved. Looking at Thorin, lying there still and pale, she suspects this was more to spare them the sight of him than to keep him from being disturbed. He does not stir, even when the door shuts, too loud, behind her.

Dwalin does, startling upright in his chair beside Thorin. He glowers at her as he settles back, but it holds no heat.

She steels herself to approach Thorin’s bedside. At least the rank smell of infection is gone - the filth of Azog’s blade nearly killed him where its edge did not.

"Fever’s broke, then?" He’s so still.

"So far as they can tell."

And it might return, so deep the blade went. And even if it doesn’t - "He’s not woken?"

She can practically feel his scowl at her neck. No, Thorin hasn’t woken, for Dwalin wouldn’t need distracting if that where so. So the fever has broken, but they do not know if it has taken Thorin with it.

No - it is a trick of that fine-boned, Mannish look he inherited from his Blacklock grandmother that makes him look so fragile, lying there. The infection is gone, the fever past, and no doubt he will wake by dawn.

It easier to believe if she doesn’t look at him, so she turns to face Dwalin instead. Dwalin, who hardly looks better than their king. There’s a second bed, not two paces away - Dwalin has his back to it, the fool. She perches on the edge of Thorin’s bed, and sets her gaze on Dwalin.

He’s barely even scowling at her, so tired he is. She opens her mouth, and finds she has nothing to say. What could she say? If she teases, he will only growl at her; if she goads, he will push her away.

"Your brother asked me to distract you," she says instead. Then, before he can snap at her, "Does he not know what Thorin is to you?”

Because there may be a spark between Nori and he, but now she sees them - really sees them - she knows it’s nothing to the flame Dwalin bears for his king.

Dwalin, it seems, is too tired to even dissemble, though he sets his shoulders defensively.

“So you’re determined to kill yourself here for him, because you couldn’t do it on the Ravenhill?”

“Fuck off, Nori.”

“Get some rest, Dwalin.”

“I can’t,” he snaps. Then stares at her, as if he did not mean to speak at all. “I tried,” he says, anger gone. “I tried, but I cannot sleep.”

“Dwalin-“

“I saw him, did you know that? Saw that damned orc rise out of the ice and cut him down, and I could not reach him.”

She had not known that.

“And after he had killed the orc, he stood, and I thought I was mistaken, that Azog had not run him through. Thorin stood, and I thought - so I kept fighting, and next I knew he was back on the ice, Bilbo beside him. If Bilbo had not been there, if he had been as stupid as I-“

“Bilbo was closer,” Nori says gently. “He would’ve reached Thorin first regardless.”

“What if he had not? He-“

“And what if Thorin had not killed Azog as he did? What if you hadn’t been there to kill those other _damned_ orcs? What if Thorin ‘adn’t come to his senses and we were still holed up in the Treasury?”

Dwalin snarls at her. “Thorin did not-“

“Exactly! All that ‘appened, ‘appened. Happened," she spits, correcting herself. "I won’t watch you kill yourself for guilt over ‘what if’!”

They’re both on their feet, now, and Nori takes her anger to help push Dwalin - he doesn’t resist, stumbling back, astonished, until he hits the bed behind him. She gives him one last push to tip him on to the bed, but as he goes down he grabs her arm, pulling her down on top of him. They land in a tangle of limbs, half off the bed, and it’s almost like she imagined, messy and abrupt, except it isn’t at all, with the hiss of pain he gives as they settle, and the sting at the back of her throat.

She starts to scramble off him, but Dwalin catches her by the shoulders.

“I’m sorry,” he says.

“Why? Just because you love him, I cannot love you?”

“You deserve better.”

“Who will I find that’s better than the King’s right hand?”

She kisses him, because it’s that or weep, and she’s humiliated herself enough as it stands. Kisses him, and he kisses back, and for a moment it’s as fierce and lovely as she’d hoped, but it cannot last.

Dwalin cradles her face, half pushing her away, half pulling her close. His gaze lingers on her mouth, heated, but when he meets her eyes, it’s sorrowful. “I cannae- I cannot give you all you deserve,” he says.

“I’m not wanting for anything,” she replies.

“I would,” he says, “but it’s a’ gone. I’ve nothing left.”

She doesn’t say what she wants to - that Thorin doesn’t even know what he’s been given, that Dwalin should tear it back if it’s so unwanted. Instead, she says, “What if I gave you some of mine? Not to keep, but to share?”

“Nori, I-“

“It’s not a mine, to run empty, nor a forge, to grow cold. All those poets Ori likes to quote, they gussy it up in fancy words, but they don’t see the truth. What you give, you have, save if they take it and keep it from you. So if he’s fool enough to keep it from you-" Dwalin makes a noise of protest, and she hushes him. “Take mine, and use it as your own.”

Dwalin stares at her, and does not speak. Humiliation complete, she moves to stand, but Dwalin catches her arm. He does not speak.

She says, "Use it as you will.”

He kisses her.

He kisses her gently, but completely. One hand on her cheek, the other at the nape of her neck, mouth soft against her own. When they break apart, she buries her face in his shoulder, and he lets her, pulling his arms tight around her.

"To share," he says, low and wondering. "If you will."

She nods against his neck, not trusting her voice. His arms tighten around her briefly, before he moves to stroke a hand in gentle patterns across her back. Her body slowly eases at the touch, settling against his warmth. She should kiss him again, she thinks, but she clings to this gentle moment, and lets her own weariness pull her down.

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> This so not how I saw this happening (like Nori); yes, it is a total cop out on my part. And now I have no idea how they get from here to not being stupid about polyamory...


End file.
